Are you tuned in? How Mumbai’s music lovers are uniting to enjoy and discuss melodies

When Shirin Mehrotra attended her first listening session in Mumbai in 2018, it was unlike anything she had attended till then. "I loved the newness of it; just the idea of people coming together and listening to something like music, and sharing information about it is really great," shares the former Mumbaikar, who now calls Delhi her home. While she hasn't been able to attend any since then, she has a vivid memory of the first and only session that she attended like it was yesterday.

At the time, she attended one conducted by Romel Dias, another Mumbaikar who hosted Listening sessions in the city, but now does it in Bengaluru. "People would come together to listen and watch music videos and then talk about the history of the video itself and also the artists in them. I clearly remember one where we watched videos of Begum Akhtar's performances and then spoke about her life," shares the food writer, who loves exploring different types of English and Hindi music.

Mehrotra is one among many Indians and Mumbaikars who are indulging in ‘listening sessions' in the city. While Mehrotra did it five years ago, the community has only been growing and has come a long way since then. For the uninitiated, listening sessions are typically a way for music lovers of different genres to come together at a venue in the city, and bond over music of a particular artist or a music album. They not only listen to the music but also discuss the artist's life and work, and focus on the particular album, era or genre of music. If music was being discussed through music videos earlier, around the same time, Jude DeSouza, founder of The Revolver Club (TRC) in Mumbai was hosting people at curated listening sessions that were discussing different musicians and their music. While earlier they were doing one every three months pre-pandemic, they now have at least three-four every month.

The frequency has increased ever since TRC has been actively conducting listening sessions frequently since December 2022. DeSouza explains, "My business revolves around the sale of gear and records. It is a niche business, and my competitors usually work with advertisements, but I did not want to do it. I wanted to engage people through something like listening sessions and other engagement activities, because even though the return on investment is much lesser, the stickiness factor is 100 times, with a culturally inclined crowd."

So, when the Mahim-based home audio store owner thought about hosting listening sessions, he decided it was going to be free. However, at the same time, he also took the opportunity to showcase their high-end systems to show people what the difference is with the records. "As a result of vinyl generally being popular, there is a tendency to make it a novelty and cool item. So, the focus on the Rs 10 - Rs 15 lakh system is to show people that it is a very serious medium and it sounds really good, and I am not trying to sell you a lifestyle."

So, while people who come to the sessions aren't able to afford it, he says, they get to learn more about the systems. At the end of the sessions, TRC also gives the attendees a memento that talks about the album, musician, and even the host to know more about them - making it a complete experience.

While DeSouza himself started hosting the sessions himself initially, he got a few friends and members of the community to host them too. "I realised that there were a lot of people who wanted to host ‘listening sessions' but were not very confident about ‘speaking in front of people', ‘what will I talk about', and after hosting a few sessions I told people to reach out to us if they want to host sessions. People don't have to own a record player and neither a record because we provide it. We just want someone passionate to talk about the music. So, that is what we said, ‘It is a session going to be conducted by music lovers'." In the past, when DeSouza hosted a Led Zeppelin session, he says 100 people showed up.

At The Revolver Club, DeSouza says they do different kinds of sessions. However, they don't follow a format. There is no fixed format to it because some like to make it interactive, others play music and then talk, and there are others who play a song and then tell the audience more about it

While there are the more academic and serious ones for music nerds, there are others that are more chilled out. "We recently hosted a session in Native Bombay, where this is no talk or discussion, but just some good music playing in the background on a high-quality system, while you are sitting with drinks and chatting with your friends." Since not everybody can sit down for two or two-and-a-half hours, he realised that while there are those who love the music and always attend the sessions and even take down notes, there are others who simply want to unwind, and that is what he calls ‘The Revolver Gourmet Club', where they tie up with a hospitality partner to play the music.

Just as there are many different kinds of listening sessions being conducted in the city, there are also many different hosts who conduct the session, depending on their area of expertise with the genre, or with the musician, and album. Yash Rastogi is one of many Mumbaikars, who recently hosted a session with The Revolver Club for fans of Fleetwood Mac, a British-American rock band from the 1960s. Interestingly, Rastogi had previously attended a session but hadn't thought about hosting one till this happened. The music buff has been buying vinyl from their record store, and in one such conversation with DeSouza, the latter asked him to host a session. "It was a no-brainer actually, I was just happy they asked," shares Rastogi.

Having been on either side of these listening sessions, the Mumbaikar sees a lot of potential in such experiences. Simply because buying vinyl and collecting them is an expensive activity, however, these sessions still let music enthusiasts listen to music through this medium and get an insight into how the technology works. It is also a great way to meet fellow vinyl heads. "There are not that many of us in Mumbai and every time you meet someone from the community you are more than likely to hit it off. It is also a great way to explore and further your music tastes. You might also end up listening to something very rare that's not on streaming," he adds.

So, Rastogi did what he does best for a session on Fleetwood Mac by focusing on the Buckingham/Nicks era of the band for his session. He explains, "This era is the most accessible and influential period of the band. I started with the Buckingham Nicks (1973) record which is incredibly rare. It's never been officially released digitally or re-released on wax despite the success the duo would later have so vinyl of the original 1973 pressing are somewhat hard to come by. Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks released it just before they joined Fleetwood Mac and it was actually a commercial failure." Despite its lukewarm reception at the time, the Mumbaikar says it has gone on to become a cult classic and it only made sense to start a session on the band with this to set up the context.

Being a true-blue fan of the British-American rock band, Rastogi says he next took listeners through the band's second self-titled album, Fleetwood Mac (1975). "I have a 2019 Record Store Day special release of the album which includes alternate takes and early versions instead of the studio recordings. This album marked a significant shift in the band's style and spurned three Billboard Top 20 hits 'Over My Head', 'Rhiannon', and 'Say You Love Me'." The session ended with everybody listening to Rumours (1977), which Rastogi believes is a seminal album in rock history. "It is an expertly crafted hit machine. I truly believe it is one of only five albums to have ever had such a level of critical acclaim, cultural significance, and commercial success," he adds.

Taking over venues

Apart from those who conduct the listening sessions, these experiences also give an opportunity to venues in Mumbai to attract different kinds of communities who can come and have a good time. While traditionally, they are being held at private standalone venues, even restaurants and hotels have jumped on the bandwagon. Abode Bombay, a boutique hotel in Colaba is one such city hotel that started hosting such sessions since September 2022 and has collaborated with the likes of The Revolver Club since then at least once or twice a month. Abedin Sham, co-founder of Abode Hotels, shares, "In a typical listening session, a specific artist or a specific album is selected. We usually get between 30 to 50 people per session. The sessions are between 45-70 minutes long depending on the album. We recently had sessions on The Beatles and Miles Davis." The age group for most of these sessions has been between 30 - 50 years and is primarily dominated by male listeners, who make up more than half of the attendees.

Such is the popularity of these gatherings that coming together through word-of-mouth and social media, that the Mumbai hotel's space is always filled to capacity with as many as 40-50 people attending them regularly. While independent spaces hosting such unique experiences is on the rise in the last few years, especially post-Covid, the likes of Abode Bombay opening up to such sessions points towards an encouraging trend of spaces opening up to unique experiences, that are not bound by traditional sensibilities of a musical performance. It is also why Sham says, "Abode has always been about a collaborative space and community. We know we have a space that is created around Mumbai, and as we have mainly got our clients from overseas, it's fun to show our space to the local markets too." With experiences like these, it only seems like the community will grow, as Sham admits, "People are definitely more keen than in the last decade. We weren't really aware of listening sessions prior to last year, and never at hotels."

Types of listeners

One may think it is something hosted only by men but as Sham points out there are at least 40 per cent of attendees are women, and DeSouza himself witnessed an interest among female listeners when he hosted a session on Canadian-American singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell sometime ago. "A bunch of women who showed up for the sessions wanted to host sessions too," he adds. Initially, DeSouza says TRC started with jazz but with the success of these sessions, they are now listening to works by singer-songwriters, electro-pop music, heavy metal, Hindustani classical, and even Bollywood because though DeSouza says he loves rock, other people want to listen to different kinds of music and come together to discuss that. While they started out small, today, they are 50-70 people attending it regularly with more younger people showing up, and that is encouraging, only because there is no "gatekeeping", and keeps these sessions open for every kind of listener. Now, he has taken it a step further by opening Records Coffee, a coffee shop in Bandra where music lovers can listen to records while sipping on their coffee.

Apart from TRC, there are quite a few people conducting listening sessions in the city. While some run music businesses, others are purely for interactive sessions, where they collaborate with like-minded listeners to host music lovers.

As they gain steam, Mehrotra hopes not only hopes there are more listening sessions for Hindi music but also wants to see them evolve into different types of listening sessions. "So when I was a kid, we would get those audio cassettes of dialogues of Hindi films and we would sit and listen to them. We had some of the popular ones like 'Sholay' and 'Sharaabi'. A listening session of dialogues will be so cool. It can go into the history and trivia about that film," she wishes.